Amazon Studios Democratises Moviemaking

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Amazon Studios Democratises Moviemaking

Amazon wants to wrangle the industry back from the exclusive, private world of Hollywood, taking the movie making business to the web instead.

Amazon Studios is looking for the next wave of directors and screenwriters by letting anyone with the talent or the inclination submit a script, give critical feedback or even shoot a test film. It's pitched as a 21st century rethink of a tired film-making model.

Then, the best scripts and test films – feature-length movies, but with no emphasis on Inception-style effects or dangling crane shots – will be put up for monthly and annual awards for big cash prizes. Amazon has already scraped together $1.1 million for 2011's award ceremony, which will be held on Dec. 31, 2011.

The very best of the bunch will go on to work with Warner Bros and be considered for production as a commercial, theatrical movie. Plus, there's a gigantic prize bucket for you, and even bonuses if your film makes millions in ticket sales.

The plan, for Amazon at least, is to democratize movie making, both by letting anyone have a go at it, and letting thousands of fans collaborate on scripts and films with mountains of feed. Then again, the jury's still out on whether crowdsourced films are even a good idea. Let's not forget the fan feedback delivered to Snakes on a Plane, and all the good that did for Samuel L. Jackson's masterpiece. Also, there's the question of whether a reinvention of the movie industry should include a major movie studio like Warner Bros.

Amazon – which knows quite a bit about movies, with its ownership of IMDB and independent film community Withoutabox – has already opened Amazon Studios for business. You can send your indie flick or your amazing script about a time travelling robot and his talking pie buddy, to Amazon today, and be in the running for January 2011's awards.